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58 A SHABBY GENTEEL STORY
pertinence, but continued mercilessly to make many more jokes
concerning poor Fitch, which were so cleverly suited to the comprehension
of the maid and the young mistress, as to elicit a great
number of roars of laughter from the one, and to cause the other to
smile in spite of herself. Indeed, Brandon had gained a vast reputation
with Becky in his morning colloquies with her, and she was
ready to laugh at any single word which it pleased him to utter.
How many of his good things had this honest scullion carried downstairs
to Caroline ? and how pitilessly had she contrived to estrppier
them in their passage from the drawing-room to the kitchen ?
Well, then, while Mr. Brandon "was a-going on," as Becky
said, Caroline had taken his stock, and her little fingers were
occupied in repairing the damage he had done to it. Was it
clumsiness on her part ? Certain it is that the rent took several
minutes to repair : of them the mangeur de cœurs did not fail to
profit, conversing in an easy, kindly, confidential way, which set
our fluttering heroine speedily at rest, and enabled her to reply to
his continual queries, addressed with much adroitness and an air of
fraternal interest, by a number of those pretty little timid whispering
yeses and noes, and those gentle quick looks of the eyes, wherewith
young and modest maidens are wont to reply to the questions
of seducing young bachelors. Dear yeses and noes, how beautiful
you are when gently whispered by pretty lips !—glances of quick
innocent eyes, how charming are you !—and how charming the soft
blush that steals over the cheek, towards which the dark lashes are
drawing the blue-veined eyelids down. And here let the writer of
this solemnly declare, upon his veracity, that he means nothing but
what is right and moral. But look, I pray you, at an innocent
bashful girl of sixteen : if she be but good, she must be pretty.
She is a woman now, but a girl still. How delightful all her ways
are ! How exquisite her instinctive grace ! All the arts of all the
Cleopatras are not so captivating as her nature. Who can resist
her confiding simplicity, or fail to be touched and conquered by her
gentle appeal to protection ?
All this Mr. Brandon saw and felt, as many a gentleman
educated in this school will. It is not because a man is a rascal
himself, that he cannot appreciate virtue and purity very keenly ;
and our hero did feel for this simple, gentle, tender, artless creature
a real respect and sympathy—a sympathy so fresh and delicious,
that he was but too glad to yield to it and indulge in it, and which
he mistook, probably, for a real love of virtue, and a return to the
days of his innocence.
Indeed, Mr. Brandon, it was no such thing. It was only
because vice and debauch were stale for the moment, and this